AFCOM Offers Recommendations on Moving to Cloud Computing

A 17-page AFCOM position paper, Guiding Data Centers to Cloud Computing, presents concepts and issues that the industry association recommends that enterprises evaluate before they invest in public, private or hybrid cloud computing.

Data center industry association AFCOM Aug. 23 announced the availability of
a position paper containing concepts and issues the organization recommends
that IT managers consider before beginning the move to public, private or
hybrid cloud computing.
The 17-page paper, Guiding Data Centers to Cloud Computing, aims to help organizations
better determine whether their systems are well-suited for and ready to migrate
to the cloud.

The report is currently the only available resource of its kind specifically
for data center and facilities management professionals, AFCOM said.

"Based on AFCOM's 2009/2010 Data Center Trends Survey, only 14.9 percent
of all large-scale data centers worldwide had implemented any form of cloud computing
as of September 2009; however, it is the collective opinion of the Data Center
Institute that the next five years will see the adoption of cloud computing
grow dramatically, and that its impact on data center management will be felt
throughout the industry," the association said.
Interestingly, the report includes the definition of a relatively new kind of
cloud structure, the community cloud. AFCOM defines this cloud infrastructure
as being shared by several organizations and supporting a specific community
that has shared concerns, such as mission, security requirements, policy and
compliance considerations.
Other highlights from the report include:

Tips for Selecting the Right Cloud Provider-Moving to
the cloud raises many questions. However, definitive service-level
agreements, understanding compliance initiatives, physically inspecting the
cloud computing infrastructure and developing a specific training plan around
cloud computing resources when selecting a cloud provider to mitigate these
problems.
Value of Cloud Computing-Beyond operational cost savings, cloud
computing offers additional business value, including preserving capital,
upsizing and downsizing on demand, and shifting the risk of handling the computing
processing load from the data center owner to the cloud provider.
Ten Steps for Building an Internal
Cloud-The report offers ten
steps to help guide the decision on building an internal cloud-from
understanding and defining the business requirements and ROI to physical and
logistical challenges.

Cloud computing
eliminates the need for enterprise data centers that do not host
their own internal clouds to house, own, operate or maintain all of their own
hardware, software and data, thereby reducing the total cost of ownership
through economies of scale.
"Today's data center is a living, breathing entity that continues to grow.
Data center managers are dealing with cramped facilities, massive data growth,
tight budgets and archive mandates that have created nearly impossible storage
requirements," AFCOM CEO Jill Eckhaus
said. "Cloud computing works to contain these issues and make data centers
more manageable and cost effective, but data centers will have to be prepared
in order to leverage public clouds, or become a public or private cloud."
AFCOM members can download
the report free of charge. Copies for non-AFCOM members cost $175.

Chris Preimesberger was named Editor-in-Chief of Features & Analysis at eWEEK in November 2011. Previously he served eWEEK as Senior Writer, covering a range of IT sectors that include data center systems, cloud computing, storage, virtualization, green IT, e-discovery and IT governance. His blog, Storage Station, is considered a go-to information source. Chris won a national Folio Award for magazine writing in November 2011 for a cover story on Salesforce.com and CEO-founder Marc Benioff, and he has served as a judge for the SIIA Codie Awards since 2005. In previous IT journalism, Chris was a founding editor of both IT Manager's Journal and DevX.com and was managing editor of Software Development magazine. His diverse resume also includes: sportswriter for the Los Angeles Daily News, covering NCAA and NBA basketball, television critic for the Palo Alto Times Tribune, and Sports Information Director at Stanford University. He has served as a correspondent for The Associated Press, covering Stanford and NCAA tournament basketball, since 1983. He has covered a number of major events, including the 1984 Democratic National Convention, a Presidential press conference at the White House in 1993, the Emmy Awards (three times), two Rose Bowls, the Fiesta Bowl, several NCAA men's and women's basketball tournaments, a Formula One Grand Prix auto race, a heavyweight boxing championship bout (Ali vs. Spinks, 1978), and the 1985 Super Bowl. A 1975 graduate of Pepperdine University in Malibu, Calif., Chris has won more than a dozen regional and national awards for his work. He and his wife, Rebecca, have four children and reside in Redwood City, Calif.Follow on Twitter: editingwhiz